Regulation checking in a virtual building

Abstract: Use of virtual buildings is a good way to get a concrete idea about future projects.
It may allow avoiding errors discovered after the construction start and thus
expensive to correct. In the near future, virtual environments should allow taking
into account the whole constraints linked to the construction project (e.g.
architectural, technical, regulations, financial, etc.). This is the purpose of CSTB's
Enriched Virtual Environments project (EVE), which aims to offer users the
possibility to couple 3D representation of the built environment with physical
simulations (thermal, acoustic, etc.) within a Virtual Building. Moreover, EVE
integrates a code compliance checking module, which provides users an easy and
quick code compliance access. This access to regulation documents enables the
user to query in an intuitive way the regulation database that applies to his project,
and more particularly according to his interest (fire security, accessibility, etc.).
This paper focuses on possible solutions to manage this last issue, which rely on the
building data structure and the database containing French building code
compliance and documents. The main objective for this work is to conceive a
matching to bind these two concepts. Data structure is based on the Industry
Foundation Classes (IFC), and some tools have been implemented upon these
classes, to allow code compliance access. The French regulation database is the
CD-REEF one.